Summer days, dog days
by fontainepen
Summary: It's summer, and a new family moves into Alfred's neighborhood. The new boy doesn't seem too fond of Alfred and he's got the weird accents and quiet a short temper. Soon enough, they become the bestest of best friends in the neighborhood- until Arthur moves away. (USUK)


One time during the second week of my summer vacation, a weird kid moved into my neighborhood. He had a really messy blond hair and really thick eyebrows; he scowled at me when I mentioned him about his eyebrows. I think he was thinking that I was making fun of them, but I thought they were pretty neat. I've never really seen anyone like him before.

The third week, his parents rang the doorbell to our house and greeted us in the weirdest way too. They had funny accents, when they said words like 'cotton', it sounds more like 'coat-on'. I mentioned it to the thick-browed boy and he scowled at me again. I don't think he really liked me that much, but his parents and my parents quickly became good friends with each other so even if he didn't want to see me, he'd usually be forced to on daily basis.

"Arthur Kirkland." He told me one day, his fingers pointed towards his chest. "That's my name."

Hearing his voice for the first time, I think I might have gotten overly excited over that. I grinned my best grin and decided to give him a noogie on the shoulder- it came out harder than I meant for it to. Arthur didn't speak to me for the next two days.

The next time I saw Arthur Kirkland, he was swinging his legs back and forth on the swing set in his lawn. "Hey Artie!" I called out, waving both hands fervently, trying to draw his attention to myself. Arthur looked up, back down to his feet and up again. "It's Arthur." That was all he murmured to me before snorting at me. I didn't really like the way Arthur ignored me, so I decided to keep calling him Artie just so I could hear his voice. And everytime I called him that, he would answer everytime by saying that Artie wasn't his name. Funny, because he never asked me what my name was.

"My dad said that it's supposed to be really hot tomorrow." The strawberry ice cream cone was melting off from the heat. A thick drop landed next to Arthur's purple canvas shoes. "Bloody, I think it's hot enough already out here." We both nodded in agreement and licked at our cones.

"Hey, by the way." By now, I was working my way down the crunchy part of my ice cream cone.

"Mm?"

"You never asked me for my name."

"Oh." I guess Arthur hadn't realized it before either because he stopped with his ice cream and stared at the ants gathering next to his shoes.

And he really never did, he only called me by the names of 'Hey', 'You', 'Idiot', 'Dumbhead', and whatnot.

"So, what's your name?" He asked after a brief pause, watching his ice cream melt down from his cone and dribble down from his fingers.

"Alfred," I replied back, sucking on my thumb to rid of the stickiness the cold treat had left me with. "Alfred Jones."

"Oh." Arthur said again, his expression clearly disapproving me of my sloppiness. "Alfred, that's disgusting."

Because it was the first time he called me by my name, I decided to give him another noogie. Arthur didn't talk to me for the whole afternoon.

July was the hottest I think, my parents called it the dog days of the summer and shook their head tiredly as they switched the air conditioner on. For some reason, Arthur's parents didn't approve the idea of turning the air conditioner on(which I thought was pretty dumb), he was shoved outside by his dad to 'cool the heat off by the nature's breeze'

"There's no such thing as the nature's breeze." Arthur snorted as he climbed onto my bed with beading off his forehead. "Heatwave, I think that's what we should call it instead."

"Your dad's weird." I remarked as I unwrapped a popsicle from its wrapper. I motioned one in Arthur's way and he shook his head no. "How does he wear those sweaters out in this weather?"

"He's an old man, no one knows." Arthur shook his head and wiped the sweat with his sleeves while his eyes stared vacantly out the window. Since Arthur spent most of his summer over at my house, it was a normal thing by now, him coming in and out of my house as he pleased.

"Alfred." He said after a while, his grassy green eyes focusing onto me now. I suddenly felt oddly ashamed of how I was dressed as. In dirty shorts and who-knew-when-it-was-last-washed shirt, and with a popsicle dripping from my lips, I must have looked ridiculous. If Arthur was just being nice, he was doing a good job because he didn't make a comment on my attire. "My parents said that we should be moving away by the end of August."

"…..To where?" I blurted out, tossing my popsicle away into the garbage.

"I don't know, mom said somewhere more nearer to the countryside."

"But this place is country as it can get!"

"Don't shout!"

"I didn't!"

Arthur kicked at the bedpost, soon sending him to bark out a painful howl. "Dumb bedposts." He seethed under his breath, rubbing sorely at his bruised ankle. I looked at him and we both ended up laughing. We laughed at Mr. Kirkland's thick gray-blue sweaters, Arthur's sore ankle, my dirty worn t-shirt, and everything else that could make us result in a fit of heavy hiccups and giggles.

Twenty days later, Arthur's family moved away as he told me before. We spent our last minutes with strawberry cones in our hand, neither of us being able to finish ours in time. As we both threw the treat into the garbage can, he promised that he would come by again next summer so we could hang out like we did.

He never did.

In college, I met this weird guy with thick eyebrows and messy blonde hair. Whenever he spoke, there was a weird accent to it and whenever he said 'cotton', it sounded more like 'coat-on'. "Arthur Kirkland, " He said one day, pointing to himself. "Nice to meet you."

And I gave him a noogie.


End file.
